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NancyLebovitz comments on Crazy Ideas Thread - Less Wrong Discussion

22 Post author: Gunnar_Zarncke 07 July 2015 09:40PM

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Comment author: Viliam 08 July 2015 10:36:19AM *  13 points [-]

Use computers to discover the Theory of Everything.

(I am not a physicist, so what I say here is probably wrong or confused, but I am saying it anyway, so at least someone could explain me where exactly am I wrong. Or maybe someone can improve the idea to make it workable.)

As far as I know, (1) we assume that the laws of the universe are simple, (2) we already have equations for relativity, and (3) we already have equations for quantum physics. However, we don't yet have equations for relativistic quantum physics. We also have (4) data about chemical properties of atoms, that is, about electron orbitals. I assume that for large enough atoms, relativistic effects influence the chemical properties of the atoms.

The plan is the following: Let the computer explore different sets of equations that are supposed to represent laws of physics. That is, take a set of equations, calculate what would be the chemical properties of atoms according to these equations, and compare with known data. Output those sets of equations that seem to fit. Create a smart generator for sets of equations, that would generate random simple equations, or iterate through the equation space starting with the simplest ones. Then apply a lot of computing power and see what happens.

(Inspired by: Einstein's Speed, That Alien Message.)

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 08 July 2015 11:11:37PM 1 point [-]

You're leaving out dark matter, dark energy, and the possibility of discovering additional weird and surprising factors.